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Janet Tran

Anthony

English 181-2

November 14, 2012

The Hidden Symbols

Simple words or hidden meanings? In Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, a normal

person can read their way through the injustices of a typical southern society while

connecting emotionally with the witnesses of these prejudices. This novel tells the amusing

and surprisingly deep story of Jem and Scout as they live out their childhoods, learn the

cold truths of the world, and witness an unjust court case against a Black man. Lee presents

the novel’s theme of prejudice through the use of symbols. 

To begin, Lee uses Maycomb, Alabama to symbolize the prejudices of the typical

southern town. Maycomb, like many other small towns of its time, has a social hierarchy

and a semblance of what someone should and should not do, so class structure symbolizes

prejudice throughout this novel. Walter Cunningham and his family pay people in favors

rather than money because they simply do not have enough to go around. Since the

Cunninghams did not have much, people generally do not want to associate with them.

Scout’s Aunt Alexandra enforces this fact when she tells Scout that the Cunninghams “are

not our type of people” (Lee 299). Aunt Alexandra’s desire to keep Scout from associating

with them simply stems from the fact that they stand on the low end of society. In

Maycomb, where someone lives symbolizes a typical small town prejudice. Mayella Ewell

and her family live next to the garbage dumps, an unpleasant place to live by anyone’ s

standards and therefore, cause the people of Maycomb to associate her with animals and

dirt. Mayella was shunned by the White people “because she lived among the pigs” (256).

This realization shows that even though Mayella does not have dark skin, White people still

have prejudices against her because of where she lived. From reading this novel the reader

can see the prejudice in the citizen’s of Maycomb’s attitudes. Calpurnia, who is Jem and

 

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Scout’s cook, naturally separates the Black and White population with her attitude about the

way Jem and Scout speak. When Jem talks to Dill about “Hot Steams”, a generally African

American superstition, Scout quotes Calpurnia by reprimanding Jem and telling him that

 “Hot Steams” “is nigger talk” (49). Even though Calpurnia considers herself a Black woman,

she discourages Jem and Scout from speaking like Black people. The attitudes of the

citizens of Maycomb show the prejudice between Black and White people and how Black and

White people alike believe they should keep to their own ways of speaking and acting. On

the outside, the town of Maycomb does not look like anything special, but on closer

inspection, the whole makeup of the town seems built upon one prejudice after another.

Furthermore, Lee uses minor characters to symbolize prejudice. For example,

Calpurnia symbolizes the typical southern help perfectly. The citizens of a normal southern

town harbor prejudices against the southern help, who are usually negroes. They believe

that the help should not know much and should not have any kind of familiar relation to the

people they serve. When Atticus, Jem and Scout’s father, talk to Aunt Alexandra one day

about the news, Alexandra scolds Atticus for speaking of a certain topic in front of Calpurnia

and says not to talk about such things “in front of them” (209). Aunt Alexandra proves the

point with her actions here. Aunt Alexandra herself symbolizes the typical, middle-class,

southern, white lady. These types of ladies always think that ladies should act a certain way

and if a girl did not act or think like a lady should, she was disgraceful and improper. Scout,

who obviously does not model an ideal lady, gives Aunt Alexandra a shock. After a fight with

Aunt Alexandra, Scout, dumbfounded as to why Aunt Alexandra cannot accept Scout’s way

of thinking, finds out from Jem that Aunt Alexandra “is not used to girls like you” (302) and

 “is trying to make you a lady” (302). Also, Dolphus Raymond symbolizes the prejudice

against those who have different preferences or views than what people consider the norm.

Society generally does not like anyone who stands out of what people accept as normal.

Dolphus Raymond, a white man, hangs around the Negro crowd in Maycomb and the people

excuse this obvious social infraction with the fact that he drinks whiskey and cannot contain

 

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himself. In actuality, he does not drink and associates himself with the Negro crowd

because he just likes to. Raymond feels as if he has to “deliberately perpetrate fraud against

himself” (268) to help the people “latch onto a reason” (268) for his ways. The minor

characters in this novel and their personalities seem to contain prejudices or have adapted

to the prejudices of society.

Finally, Lee’s major characters symbolize southern prejudice. The main characters

have a big impact on the story for the emotion of the story flows through these characters

with whom the reader connects. Scout and Jem, for example represent the typical southern

children. The southern children of this time frame learned at a steady pace and most adults

believe that children should not know much at a certain age. Miss Caroline fisher, Scout’s

teacher, even gets angry at Scout and tells her to tell her father “not to teach you anymore” 

(23). Scout’s ability to read and write well bothers Miss Caroline because most kids at

Scout’s age cannot do as much as she can. Adults often dismiss many words that children

say because children, in the adults’ minds, do not know better. This prejudice against

children shows through Miss Caroline’s actions. Another main character, Atticus represents

the prejudice against doing the right actions. Many people encounter situations in which it

inclines them to do the wrong action simply because it benefits themselves in the long run,

so when someone comes along and actually does the right action, people either admire that

person or secretly scorn them for having the ability to do what they could not. Atticus does

what most people tasked with his job cannot do. He defended Tom Robinson, a Negro, and

uses all of his power to make sure that Tom Robinson receives the fairest trial that he could

ever expect. Atticus did what anyone should do, but has to deal with most of the

townspeople and even his own relatives saying that he “is a nigger-lover” (110). The final

main character, Tom Robinson, symbolizes the prejudice against Negroes, or Black people.

Many of the southern people show a dislike of Black people and in this novel they give unfair

trials against Black people. Tom Robinson has the circumstances stacked up against him

even more simply because he is a Negro. Scout has a revelation after reading Tom

 

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Robinson’s obituary that in “the secret courts of men’s hearts” (323) Atticus could never

have won because Tom Robinson “was a dead man the minute Mayella Ewell opened her

mouth and screamed” (323). This refers to the fact that since Tom had dark skin, he would

never receive a fair trial. The main characters of this novel build upon the theme of 

prejudice.

The theme of prejudice shows itself throughout the novel through Lee’s use of 

symbols. Lee wanted readers to know about the cruel habits of society. Many people do not

want to see the horrors and wrongdoings that are happening right in front of their eyes and

often simply turn a blind eye to these actions, so Lee gives readers an emotional connection

and a blunt reality check as if to say, “prejudice and unfairness in the world really exists.”  

From reading this splendid novel, a person’s mind opens up to the world more and learns to

observe society with a different perspective.

 

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Works Cited

Lee, Harper. To Kill a Mockingbird. New York: Grand Central Publishing, 2010. Print.